


The War

by RonStepupable



Category: Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Teachers, F/F, Modern AU, a couple of silly one shots detailing a prank between two teachers engaged in a brutal prank war., inspired by the Cassunzel discord server
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:28:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27549106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RonStepupable/pseuds/RonStepupable
Summary: As far as their students know, Miss Cass and Miss Rapunzel have had a ruthless rivalry for as long as anyone can remember. When this rivalry breeds a prank war, the students are thrilled to watch the shenanigans go down, but they can't help but feel as if something more is happening beneath the surface.Or- modern-day AU where the gang are teachers and there's a prank war.
Relationships: Cassandra/Rapunzel (Disney: Tangled)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 34





	1. The Declaration

Cassandra rooted through her pockets like a wild animal, digging for the cold, clinking metal of her keys. She refused to carry a purse or a bag or tote for this very reason. Everything she needed could be held in her hands or the deep pockets of her standard shorts she wore to work. Anything else could be left at home. She found the fob and juggled with her coffee thermos as she used her ID card to unlock the heavy glass doors. She swapped the card and the coffee to the opposite hand then pulled the door open. It slammed the air out of the way as it moved, making a sucking sound as it did so.

 _How did they expect small children to open these doors?_ She thought as she entered the building. The entryway was barely any warmer than the February winter outside, something she noted bitterly as she passed through the breezeway.

As she was rounding the corner a loud clanging of flesh on glass sounded from behind. She looked over her shoulder and scowled. A tall, well-built man with fluffy chestnut hair and a matching goatee pressed his face into the door and pounded with one fist on the glass. She blanked him, not even awarding him the courtesy of a raised eyebrow. He shot a painfully pleasing look at her and she sighed, retracing her steps and giving the door a curt shove. He caught it and stepped inside.

“And a lovely good morning to you, miss dragon-lady,” he greeted chipperly, clapping her once on the back.

“Lose Your ID?” Was all she said in response, pulling her shoulder out from under his hand.

He laughed sharply, then grimaced. “Nah, I left it on your desk.”

“Punctual as ever, Fitzherbert,” she said coyly as they turned down the oncoming corridor.

“Lucky you were there to rescue me from the harrowing winter chill then,” He declared goadingly, taking a swig of coffee from his own thermos. A paper carrier cup with the Starbucks logo on it, probably something disgustingly sweet. She rolled her eyes. He really did have the most annoying habit of filling up the silence with any form of noise no matter how annoying or unsolicited she found it.

“I almost left you out to freeze but then I remembered the security cameras and thought it might look a little sketchy,” she replied evenly, her lips barely moving from the straight line they made on her face.

“To think, I was this close to mortal peril,” he scrunched his forefinger and thumb almost all the way together and shoved it into her personal bubble. He grinned roguishly at her and looked pleasingly dismayed when she did not return it. He shuffled his coffee to the other hand and struck a different tone. “So I heard you and—“

A chorus of footsteps echoed down the carpeted halls cut him off, as he eagerly looked up to find the source. Attached to the echo was a short, but muscular woman in jeans and a purple knit sweater she held a pair of winter boots in one hand and on her feet wore fuzzy slippers with cat whiskers on the toes. Her brunette hair was cut bluntly at her shoulders and floated with a serene wave-like quality around her soft, round, and freckled face. There was something whimsical about the woman, something so uniquely her. Cass stiffened, already her lips were pulling back in a smile. A greeting was just passing through her lips when the woman blanked her and flatly said, “Hi,” then kept walking. Cass and her rookie assistant stood there dumbly as the woman continued lackadaisically down the hall. The two turned and looked at one another. The corner of Cass’s lip was twitching as she stood there, jaw agape. A smile that began and ended in the creases of her eyes flickered into existence.

“What are you planning?” Fitzherbert asked, eagerly rubbing his hands together.

Cass shrugged, her face an empty wall or neutrality once again.

“Revenge.”

***

“Miss Cass!” A scrawny boy with as little length as he had fat exclaimed as he ran first through the big double doors to the gymnasium. He was followed by a line of moderately well-behaved children that all filed into the class. Their teacher, a squat woman with a face like a horse waved at Cass then immediately turned around and left, leaving the children to file into their assigned Xs on the floor.

“Yes, Nolan?” She asked, her pointer finger dotting the air in a headcount. The small boy gathered fistfuls of his blue dinosaur T-shirt in his hands and fidgeted on his X.

“Are we going to play speedball again today?” He inquired, bouncing as he struggled to sit down. She smiled knowingly then shook her head.

“Actually, we’re going to do something special today.”

The light of Christmas day sprang up in the little boy’s eyes and he sat right down.

“What is it? What is it?” He echoed. She laid a slender finger against her lips, drawn tightly back to conceal her smile. Eugene went from student to student, high-fiving them good morning and enquiring about their weekend. Cass nodded approvingly in his direction. He was far better with the children than her. She was passable, she could smile and show them a good time but they all knew she wasn’t to be prodded at or messed with. She was all business. Fitzherbert was good at getting silly, making himself out to be a buffoon (not too much of an act) for their amusement. It certainly came in handy whenever a kid burst into tears. She didn’t do well with tears, she wasn’t ever quite sure what to say and found it was better if she said nothing at all to spare any further trauma.

She checked the time on her watch and promised the antsy Nolan an explanation as soon as she entered attendance into her computer. She ducked into her office, noting Fitzherbert’s ID fob exactly where he said it would be. Her office was not much bigger than a broom closet, with a desk, a tech cabinet for the sound system, a black mini fridge, and an extra chair she kept only for Fitzherbert. Her office was rather bare, she didn’t have many fond objects to decorate it with and that was fine with her. The room wasn’t big enough for sentiments. After punching in the attendance record, she snatched a whistle off her desk that she looped around her neck.

She offered a simple greeting to the small congregation of third-graders on her dusty gymnasium floor. She sat to join them, folding one leg inward and stretching the other one out haphazardly. She leaned back on her elbows and rolled her lips inside her mouth to hide the evil grin that was no doubt illuminating her face.

“So, gang, we’ll be doing something a little unconventional today,” she explained, withdrawing a fidget cube from the deep pocket of her shorts. “It’s a task of utmost importance so the only way you can participate is to take it absolutely seriously.” She flexed her ankle and paused for a dramatic effect. “Can I trust all of you?"

A chorus of passionate “yes’” enthusiastically filled the room. Cass blew some frizzy hair hairs out of her eye and tucked the strands behind her ear. “When do you all have art class?” she asked cooly.

“Wednesday morning!” Nolan shouted eagerly from his X in the back row.

“And how do you like it?”

“We’re drawing our favorite animals right now, I like Owls, I’m drawing an owl,” Nolan prattled on excitedly. Cass nodded at the boy in respect. She could relate.

“What about Miss Rapunzel? Do you like her?”

“She’s nice, she helped me draw my dog,” a quiet, dark-haired girl mumbled from the front row. An echo of agreement followed.

“Is she always happy to see you all? Is she always in a good mood?”

They all responded positively.

“Well, I’ve found she’s always happy and chipper. Every morning I pass her in the hall on my way inside and she always cheerily waves at me and says, “hi!” she threw her voice chipper and nearly an octave higher than her own. “But this morning…” she drawled out the answer, tapping her fingers together expectantly. “Today she looked at me as if I were a complete stranger and said “hi,” in a dead, hollow voice.”

Her students stared at her with saucered eyes. She ruffled a hand through her wild black curls and tied them back with a hair tie from her wrist.

“I mean, you should have seen her, guys, she had the emotional capacity of a scone.” Behind the students, Fitzherbert snickered into his hand and raised a skeptical eyebrow that she caught from across the room. She rolled her eyes at him and disregarded him immediately. He was just as enthusiastic as her. They both had the same feral grin.

“So,” she said, folding both of her legs inward and rocking slightly on them. “We are going to visit her and make sure she gets her pep back. I need a volunteer.”

A set of 13 hands sprang like lightning into the air. She smiled fondly at Nolan, excitedly waving his arm back and forth wildly.

“Nolan, you’ll do nicely.”

Protests exploded among the crowd like wildfire. Cass raised her hands flat in the air and eased the crowd with a sharp bark to quiet down.

“No need to be distraught, I’ll need lots of volunteers,” she assured in an even tone. “Listen carefully, Nolan.” the boy snapped stiff and nailed his eyes to her. She looked him in the eye and grinned. “I need you to walk to the art room, knock on the door and when it’s opened I need you to walk inside, look Miss Rapunzel in the eye, and say “Hi,” very flatly. That’s all. Then you can come back. Can you do that?”

Nolan gave her a single, violent nod and hopped to his feet. “Right now?”

Cass nodded, the corner of her lips pulling up in excitement. “Go for it, kid.” she stopped him halfway across the room to exchange a fist bump with him. “Remember, play it cool.” He nodded, striking a cool-demeanored expression as he left the gym and strode down the hall, chin raised.

“Let’s see…” Cass scanned the gaggle of kids and pointed dramatically to an impressively tall girl in the center. “Hannah, when Nolan gets back you can follow.” She hopped her to her feet and opened the storage closet with a twist of her key. She leaned inside and grabbed a kickball. She held it in the crook of her arm, balanced under an arm the children tended to gawk at. The flesh of the arm was discolored and scarred over. She had never explained to them the origins of her burnt hand and in return, they had never asked. She grinned and threw the ball as fast as she could at Fitzherbert, who made a dramatic show of being struck by the ball and falling flat on his butt. The children laughed hysterically as he groaned rather theatrically. “Anyone wanna play some kickball?”

_

Nolan returned, glowing with pride from his successful mission, followed by Hannah and several others, each reporting sentiments of Miss Rapunzel’s fifth-grade art class’s growing impatience. The latest update was that the students inside were now refusing to open the door, banging on the windows, and shouting at the visitor to go away. With each student that returned, more laughing in the gym ensued and the harder it was to play a simple game of indoor kickball. Cass gave up playing and allowed the kids to run around giggling, teasing, and joking with Fitzherbert, who soaked up every minute of it, trying to toss a ball between them or anything that could pass as remotely active. Cass was content to joke around with Fitzherbert from time to time and soak in the success of her prank as each student came back bearing news of victory. She had fired the first shots, and now, hopefully Rapunzel could retaliate in equal fashion. She could think of nothing better to get to know the cute art teacher. Well, get to know her better that is. She was reclining against the wall on a yoga ball, smiling at the very thought when the double doors to the gym burst open and in their place stood said cute art teacher, slippers and all with a red, exasperated look to her soft, dazzling features. Her hands were planted squarely on his hips. She stared Cass dead in the eye and a silent communication passed between them: _it is war_. She plastered on a chipper smile, practically lathered in a passive-aggressive flare, and said, “Hi!”


	2. The Retaliation

Cassandra was walking down the hall for the third time that day, headed for the teachers lounge where she had foolishly stored her salad despite having a perfectly good mini fridge in her office. It was all Rapunzel’s fault. They had intercepted as they did every morning and Rapunel had smiled and gave her a wave that was more fingers than hand and enthusiastically greeted her by name. After that she kept talking to Cass and before she knew it they were outside the gym. 

“Oh,” Rapunzel said, glumly poking at the floor with her toe. “Guess this is your stop.” 

Cass looked at the dark, empty gym through the small window pane of the door. She could go sit by herself in her office or she could keep walking and talking with her coworker. Had it been anyone else she would’ve B-lined for the little sanctuary of solitude but she found herself, on all fronts, wanting to keep conversing with the art teacher. 

“Actually, I’ve got to drop off my lunch in the lounge,” she said. It was a lie. A proper white lie. Rapunzel squealed and clapped her hands in delight. So they had kept walking, talking into the lounge well after they both put their lunches into the fridge. It was nice to talk with her. Just about this and that. Catch up on what the other had been doing lately. They stayed perched in the corner of the lounge, sipping coffees until the recess bell rang and startled them out of their conversation. Rapunzel had extended an offer to eat lunch together and clearly feeling ill, Cass agreed. 

So now Cassandra was taking time out of her valuable lunch hour to walk down and have lunch with her coworkers. She was a bit of an oddball. She didn’t socialize much with the other teachers and when she did it was usually blunt and to the point. They were all passably polite to her and she was fine with that. Occasionally Fitzherbert stayed behind to munch on the chicken caesar wrap he ate every day of his life. But typically he too made the exodus to the lounge to munch on his sustenance. Speaking of Fitzherbert, she found it strange he was nowhere to be found upon entering the lounge. Rapunzel was there as promised, though, sitting at a table near the far windows, stirring a canteen thermos of steaming soup. Next to her was a plastic Tupperware of a cold grilled cheese cut into squares. She smiled when she saw Cassandra and giddily waved her over. Cass replied with a brief side-to-side, her wrist gave an audible click and plopped her salad box and vitamin water on the laminate tabletop. 

“Hi, Sunshine!” Rapunzel chirped, her airy treble twittering in the relatively quiet room. Cass’s eyes narrowed in slender lines aimed at the woman. 

“Don’t call me that.” 

Rapunzel giggled and padded the seat beside her. Now that she was here she forgot all about the nasty February weather, the dingy gym in which she spent so much of her day, and the unexplained absence of her teaching aid, and sat down to eat her lunch. 

— 

“Nice of you to show up,” Cass noted, giving Fitzherbert, the man himself, a withering look down her nose and over her clipboard. She was halfway through taking attendance when he, at last, slinked through the double doors.

“Sorry, I had a bit of an errand to run,” he explained, shedding his winter coat. “Who’s ready for some spikeball?” 

The first graders reapplied in earnest. Cass tossed him the ball she held in her lap and reclined into the spinny chair she had pulled out of her office as he laid down the ground rules of the game. She watched him split the children into teams, and scribbled a note or two onto her clipboard. Rapunzel had brought cinnamon cookies along with her soup and grilled cheese. She had offered some to Cass and despite her usual disliking of sweets, she took a few. Her stomach had attacked the foreign sugar with tenacity and Cass was feeling a bit drowsy. She was more than happy to let Fitzherbert take the lead for now, besides, it was good for him. She had just settled into the squishy backrest when the loudspeaker PA beeped and the vice principal's voice cut through Fitzherbert’s instruction. 

“Could the owner of the blue Ford ranger, license plate number 5GLK009 please remove your vehicle from the no parking zone as soon as possible…” 

Cass felt her face harden, her muscles pulling taught like the lacing of an old dress. Her hands slid into her pockets and met nothing but the shapely pattern of her thighs through the fabric of her shorts. She stood, her back raised at a pencil-straight angle as she hurried over to her office and hurled open the door. The noise of chattering students and the expressive Fitzherbert puttered out, as did the breath in her chest. Every inch of her office was coated in yellow sticky notes. Her computer, her desk, her fridge, the walls, every conceivable inch had a note plastered to it, and each note had a fraction of a painting on it. When pushed together, they formed a massive portrait of an, admittedly, breathtaking sunrise, or possibly sunset. Cass’s hands fell limp at her side, where they stayed for a moment, then her fingers clenched and unclenched and clenched again. All this and her keys were nowhere to be found…

“FITZHERBERT!” 

He was making a knowing face with the first graders, tapping a finger to his lips as if to impose secret on them. 

“What did you do?” She looked at her students and raised her eyebrows. “What did he do?”

A few brave souls echoed that he did absolutely nothing, something Cass clocked in two seconds flat. 

“Alright, well, Rachel, you’re in charge, Fitzherbert, you’re running laps.” She tossed her whistle to a well behaved, dark-haired girl in the center of the group and promptly stormed out the door. 

— 

“HOW DID YOU EVEN GET MY KEYS?” Cass bellowed, flying through the unlocked door to the art room. Rapunzel was seated at her desk, reclined in her chair, swinging a pair of ancient car keys in a loop on her finger. Her fourth-grade class was giggling madly, trying to disguise their humor behind their hands and pursed lips. “It was Fitzherbert, wasn’t it? You compromised him, you turned him against me. You had him infiltrate my own office and deface my property.” 

“Deface?” Rapunzel repeated indignantly, exchanging humored glances with her students. Cass squawked for an answer but before she could fire one back, Rapunzel threw her keys at her and said, “Think fast, sunshine!” 

Cass’s reflexes snapped and her good arm shot out to catch the projectile. She met eyes with the woman. Both were grinning with their eyes, their lips flat on their face. 

“Don’t call me that.” 

Cass sulked her way into the parking lot where her beloved truck, a tad rusty from the ice and salt, sat parked in the emergency vehicle lane. Her car was even more extravagant than her office. Cutesy animals, pretty flowers, and shimmering suns and stars covered her windows, drawn in the crude four shades of window-safe markers. These cutesy pranks of adoration were a whole new breed. Prank wasn’t quite the right word to describe it. She had just been Rapunzeled. She walked in a circle around the work of art that was her car. Her beautiful baby. 

“Oh, Richard,” she breathed, running her fingers along the smooth, cold metal. “What did she do to you?”

There was a small gap of ink on her windshield big enough to see a packet of window-safe wipes resting on her dashboard. And the front windshield? There were no swirly designs of flora or fauna, just big yellow letters composing a single phrase. 

**Hello, Sunshine.**


End file.
